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Ally Financial repays $4.5 billion of debt owed to U.S. government

DETROIT (AP) — Ally Financial Inc. says it has repaid $4.5 billion of debt owed to the U.S. government after it helped bail the company out during the 2008 banking industry meltdown.

Detroit-base Ally was the financial arm of General Motors until it was taken over by the government four years ago.

With this repayment, Ally Financial said today that it had exited the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program. In October, Ally repaid $2.9 billion of debt under the program.

Privately held Ally, which used to be called GMAC Financial Services, said repaying the debt was an important step as it continues to try to exit government support programs.